


Empty Nest

by kaeda



Series: Frat Boys Universe [5]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Timeline, Angst, Character Study, Friendship, Gen, General, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-05-22
Updated: 2007-05-22
Packaged: 2017-10-04 23:55:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/35455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaeda/pseuds/kaeda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yamamoto thinks back on his five most brilliant students.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Empty Nest

**Author's Note:**

> AU as of Turn Back the Pendulum, but hopefully still enjoyable! I suggest reading these fics in order from Surprise Visitor onward.

They were the five best and brightest; the stars of the academy, so different and yet so similar. Upon their graduation, Yamamoto immediately promoted all five to full captain. He could already tell by looking in their bright, hopeful eyes that these geniuses would give him hell.

They certainly gave him the most stressful years of his life, but nothing prepared him for the sadness he'd feel when they began to leave, one by one.

First went Kisuke, exiled from a Soul Society that wasn't ready for his experiments, leaving nothing behind. Shihouin Yoruichi disappeared around the same time.

Even though Yamamoto watched the twelfth division fall apart without its leadership, for ten long years he was glad to be rid of his most difficult student. Things began running more smoothly without Urahara Kisuke's pranks causing random chaos, and it wasn't until he saw Kurosaki Isshin and Kyouraku Shunsui forlornly drinking to their absent comrade late one night that Yamamoto realized how much he missed the troublemaker.

These men had been like his sons, but all children eventually flee the nest.

The next to leave was Isshin, with typical Kurosaki flair. Eighty years after Urahara's departure, he burst into Yamamoto's office one bright day in June, eyes shining and cheeks flushed, and breathlessly announced, "Yama-jii, I'm in love."

The silence was deafening, mostly because Yamamoto wasn't sure why this was relevant information, but Isshin slammed both palms down on his desk and grinned widely at him. "She's human!"

"She's human," Yamamoto said flatly. "What about your division?"

"Love only comes once in a lifetime!" Isshin proclaimed, doing an odd little spinning hop. "She's beautiful like an angel! She's everything I ever dreamed of! I have to go to her!"

Yamamoto sighed, but recognized the determination in his student's eyes. Isshin handed in his resignation – doodled on in the margins, of course – and the next day he was gone. Being no fool, Yamamoto knew he'd probably track Kisuke down and have the researcher create a gigai for him, but he couldn't feel betrayed. Instead he called in Aizen Sousuke.

"I hear you've been interested in a promotion for Vice Captain Ichimaru," he said. "A spot has just opened."

Twenty years later, he lost the last three.

Aizen Sousuke, murdered on his own zanpakutou. Before he could even recover from the shock, Shunsui and Jyuushirou challenged him, stopping justice in its tracks and drawing their zanpakutou in a united force. Yamamoto was angry, angrier than he'd ever been before. The past betrayals of his students – who had been like his sons! – came floating back to him and he wondered, vaguely, if events had been different, if Kisuke and Isshin had remained in Soul Society and if Sousuke had lived, would he have been faced with these two angry men? Or would he have had five of them to deal with instead? They left him for silly things like love, they were exiled because they were too stupidly brilliant. They challenged his authority for no reason. Children fly from the nest, he'd always known that, but…

But the greatest betrayal was still to come.

His fifth student, the quiet one. While Shunsui, Kisuke, Jyuushirou, and Isshin had always banded together, drinking and laughing and constantly enjoying their lives, the fifth captain he'd promoted at graduation had always watched from the sidelines with indulgent smiles, rarely joining in. They always tried to include him – ("Sousuke, drink up! Let's see how much sugar Kisuke can eat before he pukes!") – but he never quite fit in, despite their long friendship.

When he was killed, Yamamoto was saddened at the loss.

When he betrayed them all, Yamamoto was furious.

Yamamoto wondered if Kisuke would have seen through Kyouka Suigetsu, if Isshin would have smelled the snake in their mist long before his plans came to fruit. He liked to think that they would have, that they wouldn't have missed what everyone else did. Kisuke and Sousuke were always the smartest of the five, and Isshin was always an excellent judge of character. But the past couldn't be changed, and now his last student was leaving – leaving _again_ – taken away by the Menos Grande, and all Yamamoto could do was think of the graduation ceremony of so long ago, the four of them laughing and Sousuke's indulgent smile, and his own pride at their strength, their courage, and his hopes for the futures of these bright young men.

Before leaving Soukyoku, his eyes lit on a battered orange-haired figure, one of the ryoka who looked oddly like Jyuushirou's vice captain from many years before. There was something familiar about the boy's reaitsu, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

Shunsui moved behind him, and they exchanged a look. It was clear that he was not forgiven; Kuchiki was one of Jyuushirou's precious subordinates, and Shunsui would never forgive anyone for hurting the other man.

"I just found out his name," he said quietly. "I thought you'd want to know."

Yamamoto waited, quietly. Something was weighing on Shunsui's mind if he could speak of something as trivial as a ryoka's name after Sousuke's betrayal.

"That orange-haired shinigami's name is Kurosaki Ichigo," he murmured, then walked back off towards Jyuushirou. Yamamoto felt his eyes widen and slowly turned his head, staring at the angry young man demanding that Kuchiki's wounds be healed at once.

Kurosaki Ichigo.

Kurosaki.

_"I'm in love!"_

Isshin's son.

Yamamoto had lost all of his students. Shunsui and Jyuushirou were still around, but neither would trust him anymore, and Sousuke had committed the greatest betrayal of all. But somewhere out there was a half-shinigami, half-human boy, angry and powerful, with enough reaitsu to stun an ox and very little control. A boy who achieved bankai in three days, a boy who could very well grow up to defeat Aizen Sousuke.

Yamamoto wondered if perhaps it was time he trained up a new generation of geniuses.


End file.
